Hangzhou Boiler Group has been renamed Xizi Clean Energy Group, the Hangzhou-based stock-market-listed company announced at a renaming ceremony it held on March 12.

The new name, officially registered in the Zhejiang Administration for Market Regulations on Jan 28, reflects the company's transition toward the new energy sector in recent years.

Hangzhou Boiler Factory, the predecessor of Hangzhou Boiler Group, was founded in Hangzhou in 1955 as a State-owned boiler manufacturer. The decades-old factory was renamed Hangzhou Boiler Group in 2001 and was acquired by privately-owned industrial conglomerate XIZI UHC Co one year later.

Wang Shuifu, chairman of XIZI UHC Co, gives a keynote speech at the renaming ceremony for Hangzhou Boiler Group on March 12. [Photo/zj.zjol.com.cn]

Hangzhou Boiler Group completed its initial public offering on the Shenzhen Stock Exchange in January 2011.

According to the group's general manager, Hou Xiaodong, earlier this year the group, which had been focusing on the waste-heat utilization sector, established a New Energy Business Division and formulated a plan to expand its market share in new energy sectors such as photovoltaics, solar power generation, hydrogen energy, and wind power generation.

"Hangzhou Boiler had been building boilers for 67 years, but it would be, in a sense, busy ridding society of boilers for the next 33 years," said Wang Shuifu, chairman of XIZI UHC Co.